Larry Carlson is a New York based artist who’s surreal and psychedelic creations inspire and mesmerize. He has had his work shown in the U.S., Japan, Canada, Sweden, Brazil, France, India and Germany and has had his movies screened around the world. A favorite of mine, ‘The Legend of Sasquatch Mountain’ was shown at The Wayward Gallery in London in 2013 http://larrycarlson.com/flashmovies_sasquatch.htm .This interview will also feature in a book on contemporary psychedelia which will be published later this year.

Can you tell me a little bit about yourself and why you decided to become an artist?

I was drawn to making art at such a young age I don’t even remember ever not being an artist. I couldn’t not be an artist if I tried, it’s just who I am.

What does the term ‘psychedelic’ mean to you?

For me it’s the dictionary def. – psyche + Greek dêl ( os ) visible, manifest, evident + -ic. or “the manifest of the psyche”. Not the adjective most people use to describe a very broad range of music art and culture.

Do you believe that psychedelia can still exist as a movement, or it is something that only truly belonged in the sixties?

Psychedelia is beyond any one time period, especially the sixties. The sixties psychedelia thing was a manufactured event by the mass media. I think psychedelia is not something from the past, but the future. Because the great frontier of the future is in the untamed dimensions of our own minds, a way to get there is with a strong will, guidance from within and the conscious use of psychedelics.

In your opinion, can psychedelia still exist without the use of mind altering drugs?

Yes. You can make “psychedelic art” without taking drugs. For some people psychedelic drugs can be tools, but the vast majority of people who use them are not using them as tools. Only a few actually use it with the intention to express an inner world of the mind. Many visit the other side but only a handful are able to bring back something that makes sense and adds value to life. These few are the visionaries.

Speaking in general terms, would you agree that a lot of your work has a trippy quality to it?

Most definitely yes. Beautiful yet jarring, welcoming yet otherworldly, my work is the essence of trippy.

What inspires your practice?

The daily focus is to make the greatest art ever. By working, exploring and experimenting with my art as often as I can, I developed the skill to express the mystical experience and the ability to process bigger amounts of information from these other hyper realities that I explore. Every act of making art for me is a sharing with the universal forces as it manifests on the psychical plane as a form of artwork. By thinking continually of my personality as being a vehicle for the universal forces, I become the “doorway” of this cosmic process.

When making work, what do you hope to achieve?

Making the impossible come to life is a craft that I have dedicated my life to mastering. Creating something that has never existed before. What you see in my art is my own personal spiritual quest; a quest to find the courage to look into the great unknown. Making art for me is a way of actively engaging the universal forces.

What materials and format do you favour when making work?

For my handmade art I prefer to use found materials instead of paint, though I do paint on my collage artwork sometimes. Self-publishing online has been the spark that has keep my artistic fire going. The instant connection from people around the world has given me alto of inspiration to make so much work. Who I am as an artist today was shaped by my years of publishing online and getting so much amazing feedback. Now with the rise of the social networks I can connect and expose my work to many new people. My artwork is a result of free distribution and connecting directly with fans.

In artistic terms, what movement (if any) do you feel defines this era?

I would say no, there is no one “movement” in this era. This time period in art is sort of like a mirror that has been smashed into thousand different shards.

I really love The Legend of Sasquatch Mountain. Can you tell me what inspired you to make it?

I’m very interested in the real life Sasquatch phenomena, and yeah I have had real experiences with these creatures. It may sound crazy, but that craziness is what inspired a piece like “The Legend of Sasquatch Mountain” that it’s infused with a crazy, other worldly prophetic energy.

Cracked magazine voted Larry Carlson’s MEDIJATE site the number #1 Most Aggressively Crazy Websites on the Internet!

“Larry Carlson really wants you to meditate. Wait, sorry, he wants you to medijate, which is like meditating, except instead of relaxing and finding inner peace, you recoil at strange noises and find your inner seizure sufferer.” Read the rest of the article here – LINK

Dare to take a trip into his hallucinogenic work…Psychedelic might not quite cut it when it comes to trying to explain the crazy-colourful collages of Larry Carlson. It’s hard to know where to start as Carlson jams animals, religion, landscapes into spacey, rainbow-coloured collage…. read full article here.

Larry Carlson is one of a kind. Utilizing a vast range of mediums and his larger-than-life creative plug, Larry’s completely surreal works of art will make you think twice about how you see the world. His work will simply take your breath away. Larry is a multimedia artist based in New York. He frequents and fuses various mediums such as digital art and photography, collage art, video art, flash movies, soundscapes, interesting scrolls and text art. Rooted with a delicious sense of wonder, Carlson creates worlds upon worlds of supreme magic and mind-blowing whimsicality for viewers to devour with their eyes. He inspires your imagination to take flight with his vision! Making the impossible come to life is a craft that Larry Carlson has brilliantly mastered. We had the pleasure of interviewing Larry and had quite a few curious questions!

“S.O.L.U.T.I.O.N.” is a program of short films combining environmental topics with D.I.Y. surrealism, selected by artist/curator Billy Miller. The title “Solution” refers to both the idea of reconciliation and a chemical state of suspension.

This collection presents a wide range of approaches. Included in the program; cult musician/artist Genesis P. Orridge’s “Eva Adolf Braun Hitler” (which proposes that Eva Braun and the famous dictator are the same person and have been living in a basement in Williamsburg NY since WW2 !), filmmaker Ashleigh Nankivell’s “Helping Johnny Remember” which deftly portrays the sexual violence lurking beneath the surface of children’s games, artist Jonah Freeman’s untitled short which feels like a Chinatown accupressure video gone haywire, master collagist Lewis Klahr’s “False Aging” evoking the bittersweet passing of time through deft use of montage, Lisa Kirk’s mock perfume commercial “Revolution” that presents a pipe bomb as luxury item, Janie Geiser’s “Ghost Algebra” which takes the viewer on an animated journey through the use of found objects and medical illustrations to find the original meaning of the word “algebra”, Larry Carlson’s “Contact The Star People” that puts the viewer in a trance via the marriage of trippy music and visuals, Justin Lowe’s “More” which traces the graceful movement of a killer whale as it (psychedelically) travels through the water, Fritz Haeg’s short video telling the story of one man’s attempts to save the European Kingfisher bird, and finally we get a peek at Florent Tillon’s “Detroit Wildlife” that shows the ghosts of that city’s past as well as a glimpse of it’s possible future. Also on tap are a few surprises that you’ll have to be there to experience (don’t worry, it’s painless).

Total duration of program: 1 hour, 15 minutes.
An evening of fun for all… relax and float downstream!